The Fourth Piece
by dragoncaller45
Summary: The cycle turned anew, and three became four. Death became life, and slowly, evil shall become good, until balance is restored
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: Merry Christmas you loveable bastards. Please enjoy my swing at a rarely-touched idea, and tell me what you think of it. Love you all, thanks for reading.**

**Nintendo has confirmed that there are only three triforce pieces, but this idea hit me one day, so what the hell. **

You know, I thought nothing could surprise me anymore. The first time I came back post-mortem? A family in Japan where I learned to be as damn good a chef as I could, 1515.

The second? A soldier who got cut down in her twelfth fight, Africa, 1562.

The third? A politician who became the eventual leader of his small home country, Asia, 1585.

On and on it went, until I had walked in every kind, brand, and style of shoe imaginable. And oh boy did I wear some of them out. I believe 95 was the oldest I'd gotten to, during my thirty-second life, 1890, America.

And here we were, life one-hundred and twenty-five. The newest one, and the one which surprised me. Surprised me even more than the first time I was put back out.

Because I was a goddamn elf.

Or, I at least had the ears of one. Actually, my skin had a kind of Greenish tint, deep and smooth, and _holy shit is that my mom?! She's huge!_

I'd been a baby enough to know how the shift in perspective equated to the actual height of a person and JESUS she was tall. Muscular too. The kind of person you look at and can't help but feel your brow hit your hairline because _damn _she could probably break your spine with a too-hard smack.

'_Also, am I in the desert? Weird. I haven't been born in one before. Lived, yes, but never born. Guess I'm getting a new slew of surprises, this time.' _

Oh, how accurate that was, and I didn't even know.

* * *

Life was funny.

One minute, you're toddlering through a marketplace with a curious eye, and the next you're staring at what seems to be an impossibility.

While it stares back.

The boy-something Mother says is extremely rare among Gerudo(_Why is that weird_ _word so familiar?_)-looks about as lost as I feel.

Which is fair, since I'd quite literally fallen into his lap and refused to move until he explained why he, a genetic rarity of the highest class, was sat alone in an alleyway, looking homeless.

Turns out, he WAS homeless. And I felt like an asshole for assuming he wasn't.

Which, because toddler, meant I was soon crying a stain into his shoulder while fervently apologizing.

He was surprisingly cool about it all. But, hey, growing up on the street means quick maturity. I'd know, I'd done it a few times. We had been talking for a few minutes-maybe thirty?-when Mom finally found us, Mother close behind her, as usual. We all chatted for a bit until I asked if he could come home to eat dinner with us since he was without a home.

Mom had given Mother a _look _before she could say anything and the woman didn't complain as Mom essentially adopted him on the spot.

And then legally did so the next day, I'm told. I wouldn't know though.

Because after we had eaten, after the family had taken a bath in our limited-yet-hot water supply(which the newcoming boy _refused _to open his eyes for, flushing a muted red whenever Mom or myself teased him), and when we were finally in bed did he, my soon-to-be-new brother asked me something from the floor(he was down there because he didn't feel comfortable sharing the bed. _Yet._) which I felt like an idiot for not doing first.

"...What's your name, little one?" He asked just before we drifted off in the moonlight, his young and smooth voice halting, and awkward. Like he was scared to ask, or maybe even nervous.

It was _super_ cute, since he was only eight or so.

"Mida," I told him, smiling over the edge of my pillow. "And you?"

He grinned like the cat who'd gotten its prey, eyes closed and all teeth.

"Gannondorf."

I feel justified in having passed out on the spot.

Not waking up until two days later was a little embarrassing though.

* * *

Gannon had to admit, he didn't expect a young Gerudo to _literally _fall into his lap as a way to ease the beginning of this new life before his power returned, but he wasn't going to look a gift Molduga in the fangs, especially not when said Gerudo had two moderately well-off, _kind _parents who were willing to take him in without more than a glance at each other.

He would thank this child, someday, when his power returned and he Finally took over Hyrule as was his destiny. Perhaps he would grant her a seat as a royal vizier, or some such.

Well, no, she would need to prove herself to gain something like _that_, but at the least, she had earned a few anonymous donations towards her future.

In more than just rupees.

It might be a worthwhile endeavor to train her, even.

He brushed a lock of hair from her sleeping face with his normal, definitely-not-malicious-or-smug grin.

_'Yes. That will do nicely.'_

* * *

In the kingdom of Hyrule, a pair of blue and brown eyes flew open, staring into the night, lost at this peculiar sense of foreboding that flooded their veins.

**A/N: Tadaaa~!**


	2. Chapter 2: Day Three, Question One

**A/N: Since people seemed to like it**

I had many, _many _regrets. More than any single, common mortal could hope to know.

Few of them did I regret as much as taunting my dear Brother, day three of knowing him. Prideful asshole though he was, even then, I didn't realize that goading him into a sparring match was a Bad Idea of the highest caliber.

My mistake would soon be rectified.

* * *

To say Ganon was surprised was a fierce understatement. He was positively _floored._

Literally.

Because this little toddler, barely five, had just flipped him-all of ten and reborn onto the streets-onto his ass within twelve seconds, much to her own surprise.

Ganon was, in a word, _intrigued. _

The fact that a child had beaten him so effortlessly in hand-to-hand combat was a novel experience that kicked his brain into overdrive and made him smile wider than he yet had within this life. It was of little surprise-to him-when he vaulted up, grinning like a madman, and demanded-

"Again!"

"Wha-? But I already won..." Mida complained, pouting at him from the other side of their shoddily-drawn circle.

"Indeed, but that doesn't mean I've yet lost." Ganon returned with a wide grin.

Curiously, that made something spark within her vibrant green eyes.

"So it doesn't." She finally drawled, slipping low again, ready for round two.

Ganon lept at her with a laugh, swinging hard and fast from the side, she slid around the blow and jabbed him in the sternum. Before he could recover-damn this weak body-her leg impacted his knee from somewhere to the side and he was sent sprawling, red eyes blinking into the sandy gravel just outside their 'ring.'

He laughed again, pushing himself up.

"Let me guess, again?"

"Careful," he taunted, "It's learning."

She frowned, and his cheek received a sharp kick as payment once he was down for the third time.

This was slowly losing novelty.

Ganon got up again and again, each time his control slowly falling away until he was using every trick he could remember that didn't rely on his magic-_Which still hadn't come the fuck back already_-to try and beat this little _brat _of five-years-and-two-months at least once.

It took him an hour of getting steadily more dirty and bruised before he gave in.

"GRAAHH!" He screamed, slamming a fist into the sand that had, again, been intimately introduced to his face via a sharp kick to the spine. "HOW DO YOU KEEP WINNING?!" He demanded, glaring at the strangely blank-faced child above him, unsullied beyond some dirt on her cheek that he'd tried throwing into her eye.

"Because you haven' got wisdom."

His soul _quivered_.

"You have strength for sure," She nodded to the indent his fist had left in the sand, "And you're pretty smart when you need to be." Her small, pudgy hand came up to wipe the dirt from her too-small-to-be-that-_serious_ face. "But strength doesn't matter if you can't control it, and being smart is good, but you've got to be Wise to know how to use that smart-ness."

That was...weirdly insightful, even if it was said childishly. Ganon harrumphed, and dragged himself up, cracking out a kink in his neck. "Again."

"Nah," Mida said, face rising back to its normal playfulness, "I don't wanna hurt you for real, and besides, Moms cooking dinner tonight."

You could torture him about it all you like, Ganon's stomach DID NOT rumble when he heard that. Mida's smirk was about something totally different.

"So, that means more of the same-"

"I didn't say Mother. I said Mom."

He DID NOT start drooling. He _Didn't_ Goddess-damnit!

* * *

Mida had to admit that Ganon was a tough cookie, and talking childishly was difficult around him, knowing who he was and what he could do.

Seriously, she'd think he _liked _getting his ass handed to him if he hadn't lost that stupid grin by the fifth time she layed him out in three moves.

Also, turns out, Ganon wasn't good with hand-to-hand, without his Bullshit-Cheater-Triforce-Powers(TM). Who knew?

Probably cause he'd only ever used swords in the games. Well, again, when he wasn't using his Bullshit-Cheater-Triforce-Powers(TM).

Also, he was _adorably _embarrassed about liking food. What a cutie.

What was _not _cute about him, however, was the fact that he suddenly refused to leave me alone from that day onwards. At all times. When I was eating(Which he still got embarrassed over enjoying so much), bathing(Which he finally got over, yay!), sleeping(He's a cuddler, amazingly enough), and _especially _when I went to exercise(His confusion over the fact that the only 'training' I did was jogging and the occasional bout of swimming was beautiful. When he finally snapped and asked when I snuck in time to practice fighting, I told him I'd never trained a day in my life-which was true, five and all that. Watching his brain implode, explode, shatter, and then try to reform with wild, half-baked theories was_ delicious _and still makes me chuckle to this day, much to his mild annoyance.)

**A/N: Questions? Comments? Concerns?**


	3. Chapter 3: The Heart Burns, Love or Hate

**A/N: This is gonna be a long one, this little story I've written.**

It was a mistake. A simple one, but a bad one. Though, by the end of everything, I suppose it worked out.

* * *

Ganon had to admit, two weeks into knowing her, Mida was perhaps the single most interesting girl he had ever met in his many, many lives.

She spoke with a wisdom beyond her body, moved with a grace beyond her mind, and laughed with a heart too big for her little chest.

He honestly found himself enjoying her company.

The fact she had taught him more hand-to-hand then he had learned in several hundred lives was, admittedly, quite helpful for her case.

But, old as she sometimes seemed, other times…

"Oiiiii, Ganny, you gonna keep standing down there or you gonna get up here?"

Other times, she was an absolute fucking _child_.

"Keep hanging upside down like that, _brat, _and maybe you'll do us all a favor and pass out from the blood rushing to your head!"

"Pfft, puh-lease! I can swing my way up before that happens!" And she did, indeed, swing herself up with her knees, catching the edge of the roof and scurrying up out of sight. Ganon grumbled to himself and started scaling the tight alleyway wall after her, climbing to the distant sounds of her urging him to, quote, 'move it or you'll miss the sun dip, Ganny!'

Sun dip.

Kids came up with weirder words by the day.

Ganon kicked off of the top of a windowsill and caught the edge of the roof, dragging himself up. "How do you even know how to climb...a…"

Ganon could barely breathe.

The city they called home, whatever its name yet was, was nestled in a valley near the desert, he _knew _that.

But by the Goddess did he have trouble believing the desert could produce such beauty.

Mida was stood with her back to him, near the far edge of the roof, looking past the city wall out into the mouth of the valley.

The sun gazed back at her.

In all its burning glory, was the celestial giant shaped perfectly against the miles-distant entrance to their valley-home, and before his disbelieving eyes did it gently touch the horizon, igniting the sands far into the distance.

Sun dip made a lot of sense, he decided, as the sands matched the great orb, light spreading out into the dunes like a drop of gold into water, burning in front of him like the great wings of a bird, steadily growing and flowing out until the desert seemed alive.

Ganon didn't know how long he watched this phenomenon, but when the sun began to crawl beyond the horizon, when the light slowly receded to its home among the stars, he felt...saddened, by its loss.

"Did you feel it?" Mida asked from next to him. "Did you feel the pulse of the world?"

"Yes." He said before he could stop himself.

He had only said it because it was true.

At that moment, gazing out at the blazing land, his heart had pounded hard and slow, but he didn't notice till it was at its normal thrum. Ganon shook the last of...whatever that was from his mind with a few quick blinks.

"How did you find this?"

"It was pretty easy," She murmured, gaze drifting upwards into the night sky, "From anywhere in the city you can see lil' bits and pieces of it. Jus' had to look for the place it all came together." She explained, vibrant eyes drifting among the stars, drawing patterns and following lines with eyes that were _so old._

"Why did you bother?" He couldn't help but ask. "Why not watch what you could from home?"

She was silent for long enough that he bristled, ready to demand an answer from this weird, old-soul'd _brat-_

"Laugh hard, because it's always funny," She started, eyes closed at last. "Run fast, because you'll never see it all otherwise." She turned to him, and _Goddess_ but those eyes, those vibrant, old eyes felt so pained, so understanding it made his ancient, twisted soul _ache-_ "Be kind." She smiled at him then, and suddenly the child was back, full of life and smiles, lips spread too wide and heart worn on her sleeve. "Because there's never a point to anything else."

"I…"

"'Read that in a book once!" She chirped, twisting her chest opposite to the twists of her hips, turning back to the many stars above. "Good book, that. Little dull at times, though."

"...Yes," Ganon murmured, turning to watch the empty desert, "I imagine it would be, on occasion."

They don't leave until Mida's Mother-the weird difference between her Mom and her Mother still hasn't clicked with him yet-comes calling, shouting up to them without needing to search.

Mida smiles, then. Something soft and full of love, and she throws herself off the roof, into her Mother's waiting arms with an echoing laugh.

Hmph. Children. Hurting themselves so. Something like that must hurt more than his chest-

_Oh hey, his chest was on fire._

Ganon woke with a choked off gasp, glaring into the smug brown eyes of the Hylian man above him.

The man dug his boot into the bruise on his chest, and Ganon suddenly remembered why it is he _hated _Hylians since his second life as Ganondorf.

Ganon had survived Ganondorf's first loss because it wasn't a loss. It was a setback.

But to the Gerudo, it was a _terrible _loss. Their king dead, their war without victory. Hylian's were people, same as the Gerudo or the Zora, but they were different all at once. The Gerudo killed because they were ordered and desperate. The Zora killed because they had to defend their homes and waters.

After that first, terrible war, the Hylians reclaimed their old territory and made peace. But when that old, distant memory of a Princess Zelda died, when her hero vanished from the world at her loss, the Hylians did what Ganon believed they were best at.

_They killed for revenge._

Thousands of Gerudo died, hanged or butchered. Hundreds of cities were put to the sword or the torch.

The Gerudo retreated and lost millions in property, history, and land. They lost a priceless amount of lives after they lost just one babe.

They would lose more infants than they could hope to count, each lost to the desert or the flame or the stomach of a beast.

And then the Hylian's retreated again, their fill of fun and revenge over. And once again they put up their precious walls, hung their 'noble' banners over the bloodstains, and _dared _to claim their post of righteous defenders of the innocent.

That was why Ganon fought so hard, and so cruelly. For he had lived in every Gerudo who died in those days because it was _his _fault. _He _did that. All of it. He took the life of that little boy of a miracle birth and took his place. _He _had caused all of the death and destruction on every side.

It was why he never gave up, or in, no matter how many times he was killed by-

By the Hero.

The Hero, who was always a fucking _Hylian, _just like the man sneering down at him and sneering his racism and threats of selling this younger body for a few Rupees back in Hyrule.

Normally this wouldn't bother him.

_Normally he had his magic by now._

There was a loud crash, and he heard it from beyond the small, thin-walled room he was chained to the floor of.

The choked scream of a dying man.

One who this Hylian knew if his sudden leaving of the room was to be trusted.

Ganon sat up, and stared out into the large room beyond his doorway, and felt his heart _stop. _

It was Mida.

She was stood, surrounded by Hylian's who stared in horror at her, even as they waited, armored and armed.

"-If you're right." She hissed, and by the Triforce, he didn't know a voice that young could be that _cold. _"If my brother Ganon is really DEAD-!" She stopped and took a very sharp breath. "Then you better be very very careful about _how you tell_ _me._"

An arrow slammed into Mida's back, slid cleanly between her too-small ribs, and she staggered forward. She dropped her blade-coated in blood-and fell to her knees, beautiful head dropped to her chest. Two more arrows slammed into her, and she fell onto her side, all of eight and _dead because __of __**HIM-**_

Ganondorf screamed, and his magic roared back.

**A/N: Surprise?**


	4. Chapter 4: The beat of a failing heart

**A/N: So this happened. Happy belated Valentine's day :)**

Ganon knew regret. He knew that the loss of a particularly useful minion often brought him to a state of annoyance that usually ended in the death of some grunt bokoblins, or whatever lesser creature he had enthralled by the hundreds at the time.

He had almost forgotten loss.

But how could he have forgotten it, when his hated foes constantly claimed victory over him, in one way or the next?

Quite simple, really.

He always came back.

_Mida wouldn't._

He saw her take those arrows, saw the hinting of cruel, pus-like orbs warning the start of infection in her wounds when his powerful, _foul,_ magic washed the air around her in deep, hatefully purple flames, torching the _bastard Hylians_ who had kidnapped him and shot her.

None of the Gerudo had yet asked him why the building exploded in the blazing, angry tones of his purple, or why only he and Mida survived unharmed.

He appreciated that, more than anything.

They were also struggling to heal her, giving their damnedest to save Mida, even though they didn't have the resources for healing three arrows to a child, much less infection born of magic.

He appreciated that they were trying, too.

Good minions were hard to come by, after all.

Mida's parents had, _for some fucking reason_, taken him further into their little family, and Ganon was a little lost by their behavior.

They were acting more like he was Mida then himself, frequently hugging him, bustling him off for baths and playing in the yard, teaching him the intricacies of their Clan's-He hadn't known the Gerudo had clans, it was a humbling surprise-traditions, techniques, and history.

What history they had, anyways…

Ganon wasn't allowed to visit Mida, but then, why would he want to?

She was just a girl, and he was Ganondorf, he had no need of her till she was older…

He was only checking to see if he could visit daily because he wanted her parents to stop being so grossly affectionate.

That was all damnit.

He had questions for her after all.

First and foremost, _why the hell did you fly off the handle and come to help me alone?_

Second, _where did you learn to kill, and how did you best twelve armed Hylian men?_

Third, _If you so much as CONSIDER scaring me this bad again I will END YOU, got it?_

Not because he cared.

He just didn't want to find a new minion to handle his business later.

"Ganon, sweetheart," He froze, knife pausing mid-cut, "You've already made the strips of that Carrot thin enough to see through. You don't need to cut it anymore."

He gently set the blade aside and stepped away from the counter. "Sorry, miss."

Mida's mother smiled faintly at him, bustling his paper-thin slices into a pot, before turning around and dragging Ganon to her side in a one-armed hug, throwing him wildly off guard.

"She'll be fine."

Mida's mother was teaching him manners, so he didn't call the lie.

* * *

It's a week later he's allowed to visit. She looks so pale she might pass for a Hylian. Her veins are a startling purple along the lower parts of her limbs, and her long, previously flowing hair has been cut short to allow access to her back for the healers.

_His fault._

He talks to her for hours on end, telling her everything important she's missed about his learning and hand-to-hand practicing, and then doesn't visit out of embarrassment for three days, in a loop.

The cycle continues for a month, when her condition worsens startlingly. The purple in her veins has spread to her torso and neck, and Ganon feels a burning in his throat at the sight of his own work, where on anybody else(except Mida's parents) it would have given him a vindictive pleasure.

He doesn't visit for a week.

* * *

It's been almost a year, and the purple has almost covered her entire body, splitting out and slowly infecting her skin.

The healers say they noticed because she screamed until her throat ripped when the purple overtook her veins entirely.

He throws up when he hears that, but he doesn't know why. He normally likes Mother's cooking well enough.

He stops visiting for another week, on the healers' orders.

Something about not needing vomit around an already sick patient.

* * *

It is a day before the one-year date that Ganon was taken and Mida shot that the little Trio Ganon has come to be a part of is called in to see Mida.

Her eyes are open, and they make Ganon's eyes burn just under his lids, because the only skin she has left untouched is a small streak between her forehead and chin, leaving her eyes, nose, and mouth intact.

The veins in her eyes are purple, and her iris' are turning yellow.

Her pupils are massive, and she looks without looking when they enter. Ganon waves a hand past her face.

She doesn't react to it in the slightest, and his chest tightens.

He looks away from her face, to avoid the peculiar sensation, and immediately regrets it.

Her fingers and toes are twisted and mangled, sticking out at unnatural angles, pulsing with sickly yellow scars, coating her hands and feet in thousands of slits and bruises.

Her left shin has a mark that looks like an infant Malduga took a bite out of her.

When Ganon wakes up the next morning, on the one-year anniversary, he realizes he hasn't used his magic in the time she's been ill.

He reaches for the endless black mass he knows is buried deep within him.

He finds nothing, and while he's livid, raging even, for the rest of the day…

A small part of him sags in relief.

* * *

It is two days after he realizes his magic is gone again that their family is called in again.

The yellow scaring covers her torso now, and the marks have exploded in number.

The looks like a training dummy after centuries of use more than she does a child.

She is wheezing, and the Head Healer says she would be screaming if her voice hadn't shattered hours ago.

The Head Healer hands Mother a knife, long and carved and with his sigil laid under many others, with naught more than a "Whenever you're ready."

Ganon knows a Mercy when he sees one.

He doesn't know why his muscles feel like they're crawling across his bones away from the knife, but he storms out to avoid it.

Mida's mom follows him.

Her mother does not.

Ganon doesn't see either of them for the rest of the day, because he's in the place Mida showed him, as he's often been finding himself, without really knowing why.

He can't hear the heartbeat when he's alone on the roof.

And the sunset is lackluster at best, with the clouds covering the entrance to their valley-home.

Just before the sun vanishes, he stiffens. In the distance, he catches the sight of a convoy approaching.

Hylian's.

At the head ride three horses.

A king(he's guessing), and two others.

He doesn't care to guess who those two are, and he doesn't leave the rooftop until they pass by where he is, heading for the city center.

He doesn't run home. He moves briskly because its dark and Mida's parents are probably worried.

When he gets there, the house is silent.

He finds her parents at the table, dead quiet, on opposite sides of the round surface.

The knife is flat on the table, and a small part of him lights up with...something.

When he wakes up, its stood straight, point pressed into the table, and the light gutters out, and dies.

Like Mida soon will.

* * *

Ganon...feels dizzy.

They're in Mida's room.

Mida, so frail and small and sp very, very dead, is…

Up.

Propped up, and chattering in her normal, animated way through a hoarse, misused voice, and Ganon feels pressure behind his eyes begging to be released because…

She's back to her normal color...

Her eyes are green again...

The yellow is gone…

She's okay...

_She's okay._

_She's healed, she's fine, but she's being propped up by **LINK** and healing her hands is **ZELDA** and **NOTHING** **IS** **OKAY**!_

**A/N: Surprise?**


End file.
